One of my friends forwarded me this private message they received from someone on LinkedIn. This was an unannounced, out-of-the-blue message from an HR person at a company they previously worked with. Check it out:

What is your employee headcount and who is your HR leader? I used to see Pinnacle in the news quite often, but have not recently.

Um, really? You get a limited number of characters to reach out to someone, and that’s what you put into the message?

Sigh.

In case you didn’t know, that’s not really the appropriate way to approach someone that you don’t know well. It’s insulting and falls solidly into the “rude” category.

Thankfully the person who received the email is a good friend and laughed it off. She likes her HR leader. :-)

If you’re using LinkedIn for networking and connecting with others in your industry, please keep this in mind as a great example of how not to connect with others.

Have you seen other issues with LinkedIn etiquette? I’d love to hear some other stories…